Dark matter still missing

XENON100 experiment contradicts suspected signal from DAMA/LIBRA

MISPLACED MATTER A search for dark matter by the XENON100 experiment has found nothing. Photomultiplier tubes within the detector, shown above, detect light produced in interactions possibly caused by dark matter particles.

Chalk up one more loss for physicists searching for dark matter. Scientists with the XENON100 experiment have largely ruled out another experiment’s controversial claim of detecting dark matter.

XENON100, located in Italy’s Gran Sasso National Laboratory, aims to directly detect particles of dark matter — the unknown substance that scientists believe makes up the bulk of matter in the cosmos (SN: 11/12/16, p. 14).

In their new analysis, published online January 3 at arXiv.org, XENON100 scientists looked for an annual variation in the rate of blips in their detector, a tank filled with 161 kilograms of liquid xenon. Such a signal could be a hallmark of Earth’s motion through a prevailing wind of dark matter particles as the planet makes its yearly jaunt around the sun. Another dark

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